Radio Plays

Discover these captivating plays, originally written for radio and docudrama, that combine dialogue, sound effects and music to create an immersive world.

A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens and Fred Garrigus (US)
(Radio Play, Drama / 18 any gender)
Adapted as a half-hour radio broadcast including musical interludes, this play is packed full of the thrill of the Mysterious Spirits’ warning, the hard-hearted Scrooge, and all the Christmas joy in the Cratchit home.

Abrogate by Larry Gelbart (US/UK)
(Full-Length Play, Dark Comedy / 3w, 6m)
Hillary Clinton is now president and, in an attempt to sift through the debris of the post-Bush regime, she holds a congressional meeting to explore how the atrocities during the previous administration could have possibly happened. As the hearing progresses, some shocking truths about the infamous conservative leaders are revealed.

All That Fall by Samuel Beckett (US/UK)
(Radio Play, Drama / 2w, 6m, 1 girl, 1 boy, 11 any gender)
This radio play follows the journey of an old woman, Maddy Rooney, to the train station pick up her blind husband. In the course of her travels, she meets a carter, a businessman, a racecourse clerk and a stiffly Protestant spinster. Maddy accompanies her husband home, and it is revealed that Mr. Rooney might have been responsible for the earlier train delay caused by a child falling out of a carriage.

Embers by Samuel Beckett (US/UK)
(Radio Play / 2w, 3m)
Henry’s father ended his life in the sea; for the rest of his life, Henry is doomed to the sound of the waves roaring in his ears. For 20 years, he has talked incessantly to drown the tempest of his father’s watery grave. His wife, Ada, chatters and listens and endures, his child goes through the incidents of a child’s life, and still the sea roars in the background.

Floodgate by Larry Gelbart (US)
(Radio Play, Satire/Political Satire / 3w, 11m)
The play features highlights of a faux congressional committee’s investigation to determine responsibility for the equally faux, farcically disastrous events that recently swamped and overwhelmed the nation’s capitol. The chief casualty of the hearings: the destruction of what little is left of the English language.

Girls & Boys by Dennis Kelly (US)
(Full-Length Play, Drama / 1w)
An unexpected meeting at an airport leads to an intense, passionate, head-over-heels relationship. Before long they begin to settle down, buy a house, juggle careers, have kids – theirs is an ordinary family. When their world starts to unravel, and things take a disturbing turn.

Mastergate by Larry Gelbart (US)
(Full-Length Play, Satire/Political Satire / 5w, 12m)
The C.I.A. has armed banana republic guerrillas with millions laundered through the budget of the forthcoming epic Tet: The Movie. Television reporter Merry Chase provides the play-by-play as witnesses squirm before dimwitted congressional interrogators who want to know what the President knew… Did he have any idea that he knew it?

Murder in the Studio by Agatha Christie (US/UK)
(Collection / Anthology, Melodrama / 5w, 9m)
A collection of three radio plays – including a Poirot story – for live performance, comprising Personal Call, Yellow Iris and Butter in a Lordly Dish.

• Personal Call (US/UK) sees James Brent haunted by his dead wife when he receives a mysterious telephone call, seemingly from beyond the grave.
• Yellow Iris (US/UK) marked Hercule Poirot’s debut appearance on radio. The famous detective is called to the hotel Jardin des Cygnes to solve an old case in which a cold-blooded killer escaped justice and slipped through his fingers.
• Butter in a Lordly Dish (US/UK) sees eminent prosecution barrister Sir Luke Enderby get his comeuppance in one of Christie’s most gruesome and horrifying murders.

Rough for Radio I by Samuel Beckett (US)
(Radio Play, Drama / 1w, 1m)
An anonymous woman visits a cold, gloomy man, thinking she is there on his invitation. When politeness only extends so far and circumstances become increasingly cryptic, the woman departs, leaving the man alone once more with his “needs,” which we soon learn may require the attention of a doctor. See also Rough for Radio II (US).

Sherlock’s Secret Life by Will Severin and Ed Lange (US)
(Full-Length Play / 3w, 5m)
This original play with musical underscoring – about the world’s most famous detective during his youthful years of collaboration with Dr. Watson – is firmly grounded in Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s characters. It is a fascinating mystery, an enchanting romance and a wonderful comedy.

The Scottish Play by Graham Holliday (US/UK)
(Full-Length Play, Comedy / 7w, 6m)
This fast-paced and witty comedy follows the hilarious travails of Michael, who discovers the extent of the infamous theatrical jinx when he attempts to stage a production of Shakespeare’s Macbeth with the Shellsfoot Thespians.

Under Milk Wood (The Definitive Edition) by Dylan Thomas (US/UK)
(Full-Length Play, Drama / 17w, 17m, 69 any gender adult)
In lyrical, soaring and earthy prose, verse and song, the most controversial poet of the mid-century stages a twenty-hour midnight pub crawl of a Welsh fishing village, exposing the victorious and the venal among the denizens of a provincial Welsh fishing village.

Welcome to Our Village, Please Invade Carefully by Eddie Robson (US/UK)
(Full-Length Play, Comedy / 3w, 3m)
This play ingeniously combines elements of science fiction and the idyllic charm of rural British life. Katrina Lyons only visited Cresdon Green for the weekend to see her parents (and, incidentally, ask if they might lend her the deposit for a flat). Unfortunately, this happened to be the weekend when aliens launched an invasion of the village and put a force-field around it. She is trapped in the place where she grew up, under the cosh of alien oppression, living with her parents. Katrina is determined to save the world from the alien warlord’s invasion of the Earth. See also Series 2 (US/UK).

Words and Music by Samuel Beckett (US/UK)
(Radio Play, Dramatic Comedy / 3m)
This radio play sets up a dynamic between “Words” and “Music” as two character voices, existing in an uneasy relationship and under the command of a mysterious figure named Croak. A somewhat distracted tyrant, Croak issues commands to both Words and Music – whom he calls “Joe” and “Bob” respectively – to formulate expressions on a series of topics including “Love,” “Age,” and finally “the Face.”

For more recommendations, visit Concord Theatricals in the US and UK.